Enjoyed the articles about us ordinary people

As I always told my daughter, "that may be the reason, but it isn't an excuse."

Ion,I don't understand why you mention about be able to beat people in freestylethat are middle age women. I notice that you don't mention breaststroke, maybe we can beat you in that stroke.

Is there no administrator monitoring this forum? I participate in a number of similar discussion groups for my profession and from time to time a thread will be closed (locked) by the administrator when posts start to get personal or petty. It's human nature to want the last word. This discussion forum is a great asset to anyone interested in improving their swimming. Please let's keep it that way!

I only sneak in now, but I will check in, and dissect the latest posts later on. At first glance, it seems to me that Craig's latest take, does stand out again. Jeff, what you are joking about regarding me, that could be one adult competitor's ethics story. Other extraordinary adult competitor's stories are that July 27 in that La Jolla meet, I have seen Maxine Merlino age 91 racing a 1500 meter free, Rita Simonton age 85 swimming a 1500 meter free in 32 minutes (that's fast), and Barbara Dunbar doing a 1500 meter free in 19:48. I will resume here, later on. Stay put...

Ion, you certainly have a right to express your opinion that you don't like the content of SWIM magazine. Where you are out of line is dismissing Rita's story simply because she is overweight. I happen to know Rita. She was a fixture at all the Kentucky meets before she moved away. And she's a delightful person. Relentlessly cheerful, positive, funny, intelligent, supportive. I never swam at a meet with her that she didn't come up to me and congratulate me on my own swimming. She has good strokes, and as she says herself is actually not a bad breaststroker. I find her story inspirational. In spite of serious health problems, she continues to make the effort to get to the pool and work out. Yes, she might do herself another favor by skipping the ice cream and cookies afterwards, but the same could be said of me (and probably a hefty -- pun intended -- percentage of USMS members). I enjoy reading articles about the truly gifted Masters swimmers, and about stroke technique, but a steady diet of only that would bore me. I appreciate Phil and Bill's efforts to broaden the scope of the magazine, so that everyone can find something that interests them. I found the "funky pool" article to be a lot of fun, and also enjoyed getting to know Mike Collins a little better. You didn't like the article about Rita? Fine. But some of us enjoyed it very much.

This is a great thread. It tells me exactly who I should add to my "Ignore List"

I think the solution is right under our noses! Ion needs to publish his own magazine! "Fast Ion Swimming" - The swim magazine that addresses the needs of the late blooming mathematics-engineering hand selected immigrated svelte multi-linguistic "elite" swimmer. Each article written by Ion, it could be published in Romanian, French, German and English. That would give Ion four magazines to read so he wouldn't need to waste his time reading the fluff in SWIM Magazine. And as an added bonus to Ian, he could pick up the additional income that would alow him to unleash his potential at all future Nationals!

This thread has gone in a number of directions. Most have been entertaining. It’s great we have so many people impassioned about our sport! And a note for those among us who are looking for more "technical articles on training and conditioning, written specifically for the club coach and the self-coached swimmer, which explain in detail why some swim programs consistently turn out world class athletes". May I suggest looking into Swimming Technique Magazine? Just as I wouldn’t expect to find Wall Street Journal type information in USA Today, I don’t expect to get highly technical articles on every page of Swim Magazine. This doesn’t make USA Today a bad newspaper or Swim a bad magazine; it just means I expect to get different news from different sources. And if you want even more technical information, there is a plethora of technical swimming books and videos on the market. Many of these are available through the Masters lending library.

Perhaps I'll begin a new thread focussing on the content of SWIM magazine. Oh, I forgot, that was the intent of this thread.

These two focus on the content of Swim Magazine: Originally posted by Ion Beza ... ...and after re-reading the Sept./Oct. 2003 Swim magazine, I stick to it being a waste. .) 'Making Masters Fun: Is Your Pool FUNKY?': is a waste; .) 'Goal-Setting': how much more banal and generic can you get?; .) "...I just love the pursuit of doing something right,..." in page 21: who doesn't? and since when has this slogan been the profound recipe of any achievement in line with my achievements I am talking about?; .) not one analysis in Swim magazine of a high achiever's ethics. When people in this thread mention that when unhappy with the information in Swim magazine, I have the option to gather my information elsewhere, I point out to them that when posting frequently in this forum, I do display knowledge of information that I gather from other sources -information that Swim magazine doesn't afford-. ... and Originally posted by gull80 I think that Ion is looking for something that SWIM does not provide, specifically a focus on the more "serious" Masters swimmer (ie those who train to compete). By necessity the articles cover a wide range of topics to appeal to the varied backgrounds and interests of all USMS members, the majority of whom apparently don't compete. As I said in an earlier post, there are many issues that are unique to the older swimmer; we are different physiologically from our younger counterparts, and have more health problems. We injure more easily and heal more slowly. We have less time to train and more outside commitments. There are fundamental questions like how often to train, how much yardage is "enough," how to avoid injury and where to turn when we are injured. Much of the information out there is written for younger swimmers and may not be relevant or appropriate for Masters. This is not meant as a criticism of SWIM, but an observation. Probably a publication like that would not attract enough of a following. We can further discuss Swim magazine, after these points having been submitted and largely established by now.